


These Many Moons Past

by coffeestainsandcashmere



Category: The Eagle | The Eagle of the Ninth - All Media Types
Genre: (not from Marcus), Eventual Smut, Fluff, M/M, Misunderstandings, Mutual Pining, Pining, Unwanted Sexual Advances, bit of angst, esca has so many feels but isn't sure how to show them, esca's pov, marcus needs to use his words, mention of past abuse/asault (with the seal people), not described though
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-02-15
Updated: 2021-02-26
Packaged: 2021-03-17 05:27:43
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 19,825
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29466492
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/coffeestainsandcashmere/pseuds/coffeestainsandcashmere
Summary: After the final battle with the Seal People, Marcus and Esca take a week among the Selgovae to recover their strength and rest. Marcus seems oddly determined that Esca should remain up here with the Selgovae, and Esca can't quite figure out if Marcus is trying to get rid of him. Doggedly determined, he stays by Marcus' side, and they journey south again together. Outside Eboracum, however, in the heartland of former Brigantes territory, Marcus asks Esca if he wants to make a detour into that familiar landscape one last time.'These Many Moons Past' is the story of their journey home, and how they process everything, and finally,finally, figure out what they mean to each other. Aka, idiots in love.
Relationships: Marcus Flavius Aquila/Esca Mac Cunoval
Comments: 19
Kudos: 41





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> “Therefore they did not greatly begrudge freedom to Esca, accepting it as something that was likely to have happened one day or another – he and the young master having been, as Sassticca said, the two halves of an almond these many moons past…” Chapter Ten, Rosemary Sutcliff
> 
> I thought the quote was appropriate for this story. It starts off rather introspectively, but the pace of the plot picks up when they leave the Selgovae and head south again. They've both got issues to work through, I think, and Esca strikes me as the kind of person who's got an awful lot going on in his head, but doesn't show much of it, which can lead to complications with people like Marcus who can't keep a single emotion off his face and yet has a hard time articulating what he really wants. 
> 
> I really hope you enjoy it! It's a mix of book, film, and AU.  
> I'm on Tumblr at [coffeestainsandcashmere](https://coffeestainsandcashmere.tumblr.com) if you're active on there and want to say hi.

They spent a week in those birch woods, just one valley over from that dark gorge where the final, frantic battle with the Seal People had snuffed out the last ghosts of the Ninth.

No more than an hour after cremating the corpses of the fallen, Marcus’s own body had finally succumbed to exhaustion, fever, and the hacking cough that had been louring around him for weeks. Somehow he had staved it off until then through sheer force of will, but with his wounds slowly festering in the mud and midge-ridden bog-water of the Highlands, it had been only a matter of time before it caught up with him.

Esca had tried to catch him as he went down like a poll-axed bull, but with the battle-weariness seizing his own muscles, the pair had toppled together in a tangle of limbs onto the rocky bed of the river gorge, and it had been two of the surviving legionaries who had pulled them out of the freezing water and onto the bank.

Esca, who had not been regularly beaten and half-starved for two weeks, rallied first.

When Guern’s people had come to collect their dead and care for the surviving wounded, they found Esca tending to him, plying Marcus with a strong, bitter willow-bark tea while the Roman shivered and raved beneath damp blankets. Some of the half-formed phrases that slipped free of his lips during that fever turned Esca’s stomach to brackish ice. He knew then for certain that Marcus had suffered horrors among the Seal People that Esca himself never had as Marcus’ own slave. Guilt gnawed at him, and he refused to leave Marcus’ side even for an instant.

“I’m sorry,” he mumbled in his own language as he dabbed the beading fever-sweat from Marcus’ forehead.

“…sca…” Marcus whimpered, fingers scrabbling at the rough, damp cloak that mostly covered his tall frame, eyes rolling, unseeing and fretful. “Don’t leave. Please… Please don’t —” he choked off and then began to cough so hard that Esca had to roll him onto his side for fear that he’d suffocate.

With a hand cradling Marcus’ head, Esca murmured, “I’m here, Marcus. I’m here.”

The big black mare that had so gallantly borne Marcus from Wall to northwestern coast, and who had carried the pair of them more than halfway back again, had miraculously ambled into their makeshift camp the day after the skirmish. She was now as much a part of the hodgepodge group of Britons and Romans as were Esca and Marcus, and she stood silent sentry at the fringes of the camp and loomed protectively over the smaller, native mounts. The dark Roman horse seemed to have won over the hardy little British ponies without objection. Somehow, Esca found he could relate, and he wasn’t sure how he felt about that.

The Selgovae and their healer had offered rich heather honey and herbs to add to Esca’s tonic of willow-bark, and a salve for the new cut on Marcus’ bad leg, as well as dry clothes and fresh food, and, perhaps most importantly, support and safety. 

Before two full days had passed, Marcus’ fever broke.

He blinked, taking a stronger, deeper inhale, and he opened his eyes. “Esca.” 

Something in Esca eased a little then for the first time since the Epidii had descended on them in that narrow gorge. “Welcome back, Marcus,” he said with a tight smile. 

Despite surviving that wild, searing fever, Marcus remained weak as a babe for another two days, and it was three before he could sit up properly and talk with Esca without falling asleep mid-sentence. His cheeks were sallow, and thanks to his treatment at the hands of the Seal People he’d lost a little of his muscular bulk, his clothes hanging off him in a way they hadn’t on their way up to Caledonia.

Gone too was the prideful, at times even arrogant, look of a Roman who believed himself to be right in all things simply because he followed the code and laws of Rome. 

On the sixth evening in their makeshift camp with the Selgovae, Esca made his way over the damp leaf-litter to where Marcus was sitting alone. His eyes were peacefully closed and he was leaning his broad back against the bole of a large oak. In his lap rested the head of one of the Selgovae’s hunting hounds, and were it not for the slow movement of his fingers through her coarse grey fur, Esca might have thought him asleep. About his shoulders someone had wrapped another, thick, woollen shawl, and he had a heavy blanket over his outstretched legs. Beneath the bad one, he had rolled up a blanket to support it and keep it off the cold forest floor.

Without opening his eyes, Marcus croaked, “Another raw rat for me, Esca?”

Esca laughed softly and crouched down beside him. Not many people could hear Esca’s light tread, even out here in the forest. It seemed somehow that Marcus had felt rather than heard his approach, and the thought warmed Esca a little. 

Extending the hand bearing a carved birch bowl and pressing it into Marcus’ free hand, he grinned. “Something much better than raw rat. Roast rabbit, with dandelion leaves and a few fire-roast tubers and mushrooms. This will put the colour back in your cheeks.”

“You want me rouged up now, do you?” Marcus smirked, though his tone fell a little flat. He had still not opened his eyes and when he made no move to bring the food to his mouth, Esca’s newly-kindled jollity slipped. He was still too weak, too…  _ sad _ , for a man who’d achieved the impossible, as they had.

“I like you plenty as you are,” he said, patting Marcus’ shoulder as he rose. “Now, eat.” He forced himself to ignore the way Marcus’ empty banter had made his stomach flutter. The dog lifted her head and began to sniff at the bowl with decided interest, so he added, “I think you’ve got competition. Eat up.”

Marcus finally opened his eyes and blinked up at Esca, his expression startlingly soft and frank. “Thank you,” he whispered, consonants slightly slurred with lingering exhaustion. “I don’t deserve any of what you’ve given me.”

“You gave me my  _ life _ , Marcus,” he said with a fierce scowl. “I would have died that day in the ring, if not for you.”

But Marcus shook his head, his beautiful eyes clouding. “I didn’t do it out of kindness, Esca. I don’t know why I did it, but it wasn’t out of the good of my heart.”

Esca would remember that day for the rest of his life: Marcus, newly wounded and sickly pale for a Roman, staring down at him like he’d seen the mirror of his own soul down there in the stained sand of the arena. 

“I don’t care if you know why you did it or not,” Esca muttered. “You gave me my life. The least I can do is care for you now.”

Apparently that was the wrong thing to say because his friend’s face shuttered and he nodded. “I see. Thank you.” Those last words were a clear dismissal harking back to former times.

Esca frowned, but one of the Selgovae called to him from the cook fire, and he turned away to answer her.

Just over a week after the battle, Marcus was back on his feet, if unsteady as a newborn fawn at times. Perhaps a goat would have been more fitting since he was twice as stubborn, and very wilful about not lounging around the camp, even if that was exactly what his exhausted body still needed. His new leg-wound was closing up nicely, the flesh not too red and inflamed, but the pain of the old wound seemed to bleed up his leg and mix with the sharper pain of the second, stiffening the already distorted muscle and robbing him of breath if he went too far on it.

“It’s like the beginning all over again,” he snarled that afternoon as they prepared their gear for impending departure.

In a fit of sudden frustration, he flung down the makeshift staff that Esca had carved for him with a borrowed whittling knife. The ash stave sent dry autumn leaves scattering in a flurry, and the mare, whom they had recently come to call ‘Gallant’, shied and then whickered reproachfully at him for startling her from her tethered doze.

“Sorry, girl,” Marcus murmured, hobbling the last few paces over to her and stroking her dark neck with his big, scarred hand.

Watching, Esca’s whole body flushed and his heart clenched strangely at the unbidden thought of being on the receiving end of Marcus’ hands. There was a time not so long ago when there had been nothing more repulsive in the entire world than the thought of enduring a Roman’s hands on him. Largely he still felt the same, but Marcus… Marcus was different.

Marcus’ hands were big and deadly and powerful, but despite his being a Roman soldier, Esca had seen the quiet, gentle man beneath. He had the hands of a craftsman, of a builder, not a murderer and a brute, and although he had certainly killed plenty of people in his young life already, it was obvious that he took no joy in the necessity of it. After all, he’d been violently sick after killing the little boy who had ambushed them around their campfire with his elders.

Furthermore, the way Marcus held the carved wooden pendant of that little bird, turning it over and over in his fingertips like a talisman, murmuring prayers to his gods in that deep, rumbling voice, had awoken something in Esca. The way he traced the dolphin engraving on his father’s emerald ring, while the fine gold-work glinted in the campfire’s light and reflected green-gold in his eyes; the way he quieted the affronted mare with a simple touch… Esca fastidiously catalogued those touches and the act sparked a growing craving in himself, and he chastised himself severely for it.

Not only was he a Roman, but Marcus had never shown so much as a flicker of interest in Esca, rarely touching him unless it was absolutely necessary to support his leg, always letting go as soon as he could. Never once in his time as Marcus’ slave had Esca been called to do the things that former masters had demanded, and not once had he ever seen Marcus exhibit so much as a flicker of sexual interest for  _ anyone _ , let alone for him.

Marcus must simply not be interested in men, let alone in a short, scrawny, wiry Briton like Esca. He wondered whether the women in Marcus’ native country were so different, and whether Marcus would go back to them once his leg was strong enough, to settle down and marry. That thought hurt even more, and he bit it all back, locking it away deep inside himself.

Turning away from Marcus and the horse, Esca vowed to get over this pathetic attachment by the time they reached Eboracum.

As he moved to distract himself from his thoughts by packing their saddlebags for the next day, he found one of the Selgovae elders chuckling good-naturedly at him from beside a small campfire. 

Although the dialects varied hugely among the tribes of Britain — some with truly impenetrable accents, and bizarre words and phrasing — mostly they all made themselves understood whenever they met, and the Selgovae were not so different from the Brigantes, both in language and in custom. That in itself was hardly surprising, since the northernmost territories of the Brigantes’ had overlapped with the Selgovae’s for generations before the Romans’ accursed Wall had sliced across the land from coast to coast and cut the tribes off from one another. He wondered if north would ever reconcile with south, or whether the divide would tear the people of Britain asunder forever. Perhaps one day, all the world would be Roman anyway and it wouldn’t matter who had been there before. He shuddered.

Ancient as the stones around them, the crone by the fire was bent nearly double, and yet somehow she’d made it all the way out here from wherever the tribe usually settled as the year rolled on towards winter. It was a miracle of the gods that she  _ had  _ come along because it had been she who had added the preserved dill, comfrey, and chamomile to the tincture, among other, less savoury-looking ingredients, which had reduced the puffy, angry infection in Marcus’ leg within a day. The rub she’d smeared across his chest had stunk to the heavens, but it too had done its job and hastened his recovery.

With a sun-browned finger as gnarled and crooked as a tree root, she beckoned Esca over to where she sat on a stump near the flames.

“Elder?” he said respectfully, dropping to one knee beside her so that she didn’t have to crick her neck to look up at him. Not that Esca was tall by any stretch of the imagination, even by the standards of his own people, but almost anyone over the age of six would have been beyond her eye-level with that stooped back of hers.

She cackled fondly again as he knelt, and ruffled his hair in a way that made his chest constrict. When was the last time someone had voluntarily touched him with open affection: without demand, without dominance, without contempt? On their flight from the Epidii, Marcus had clung to him, hanging painfully off his shoulders for what felt like days, but that had been a necessity for Marcus, not a kindness to Esca. 

Unbidden, he thought of his mother, and then, as always, of her last, wide-eyed moments as her throat was cut by her own, weeping husband. Hers had quite possibly been the last gentle touch Esca had received, over eight years ago now. He had to blink away the sudden tears.

“You’ve grown fond of your Roman warrior,” she said in a voice like creaking branches as she withdrew her hand. His heart beat strangely for a few seconds and he struggled not to lean in towards her again, chasing the contact.  _ Like a neglected dog _ , he scolded himself.

Esca shrugged. “We’ve been through a lot,” he said, but his voice cracked damnably, “And he’s been good to me. For a Roman.”

“And you to him.”

“In the end,” Esca admitted through clenched teeth.

“In the end?” she repeated, black eyes glittering with sudden interest. “Tell me.”

Esca’s gaze sank to the gold mosaic of autumn leaves beneath their feet, and he sighed. “He spoke for me when I was a gladiator in the Roman fighting pit, when all I wanted was to die with my eyes on the sky above. To be free.”

“Did he now?” the elder smiled toothlessly. “Go on.”

Reluctantly, Esca spoke, but his words came out in choppy fragments and half-formed sentences. “He turned the whole crowd to favour me… They’d been baying for my death only minutes before. I was half-starved and caged like one of their beasts, and I needed freedom, release… an end. Instead, I was bought by his uncle without Marcus’ knowledge, and told to serve him. Nursed him through his first leg injury. Doesn’t seem fair he should have another added to it,” he finished glumly, unaware that he had begun to ramble.

It felt good to unburden himself though; his own native language rolling easily over his tongue and teeth in a musical lilt that was largely an impenetrable tangle to Marcus. Besides, Latin felt too clean, too sterile, too formal, for such deep-running emotion.

When the woman seemed interested in hearing more, he set his jaw and adjusted his position so that he sat cross-legged, heedless of the damp that crept up into the weave of his worn-out braccae from the ground below. 

The old woman just sat quietly, still as a mushroom, with her eyes twinkling. Listening.

“I thought he was such a brat,” Esca huffed. “Still do at times, if I’m honest. He’s entitled, and prideful, and —” he cut off, heat stinging his cheeks and making his eyes water. “Stubborn,” he ploughed on. “And stupid, and wilful, and bull-headed, and --.”  _ And loyal, and honest, and kind, and gentle, and handsome, and — _

The elder began to laugh again. “You love that Roman, Esca.”

“Yes,” he admitted, staring at his rough fingers twisting together in his lap. “Gods help me and ancestors forgive me.”

“Does he know?”

He shook his head miserably. “I doubt it. He can’t see past the end of his stupid Roman nose.” Marcus actually had quite a nice nose. Not that Esca would ever have admitted that aloud, even to himself.

She flicked her rheumy gaze over to where Marcus still stood close to the mare, talking quietly to her and running his hand repeatedly down her neck. He wondered what Marcus was telling her; whether he was unburdening himself as well. Gallant’s ears twitched forwards whenever he said something to her, and she flicked her tail lazily, resting one hock and relaxing into the sound of his warm voice.

“He sees much,” the elder offered. “Give him time. He may be those things, but he has a good heart.”

“For a Roman…” Esca sighed and cleared his throat. “I should continue packing. Can I fetch you anything, mother?” he asked, addressing her in much the same way any Briton would address a clan elder of her age and esteem.

“No, lad,” she said. “You finish your preparations, and you take care of your dear, stubborn Roman on the long way South, hmm? It will not be an easy journey for him, even with those poultices. You must take it gently.”

It would be easier by far than the journey that had brought them to this Selgovae camp though. “Aye,” he nodded, grinning rather grimly and rising from the leaf-litter.

Before he’d gone a single step, she scoffed, “Ach, come here!” And, snatching the back of his ripped tunic with astonishing speed for someone so old, she promptly proceeded to thwack the dirt and twigs off his legs and backside with her hand like he was a tiny, miscreant child. He squawked and squirmed and was finally released, cheeks aflame.

And then he caught a sound he’d not heard since the pair of them had last hunted boar together down at Calleva.

Marcus was laughing.

Esca went still at the sound of it, but it lifted his heart and he smirked privately, unable to stop the expression twisting his mouth up despite his embarrassment. “Shut up,” he groused as he stumped over to their packs with Marcus’ dry chuckle still filling his ears. Gods, but it was good to hear that sound after so much suffering.

Despite his short outburst of mirth though, Marcus became particularly quiet and withdrawn that night at their farewell feast of roast wood pigeon and rabbit, mushrooms, roots, nuts, and tubers. He ate just enough to be polite, though he picked listlessly at his food when he thought no one was watching. 

At Esca’s urging he ate a little more to build his strength for the next few days’ ride to the Wall, but his heart wasn’t in it. He ate because Esca told him to, just like he had when he’d first been injured, and it chilled Esca’s blood.

“What’s wrong?” Esca finally hissed while Marcus just stared off into the fire, letting the unfamiliar words of the surrounding Selgovae wash over him in a senseless blur.

“Hmm?”

“What’s the matter with you?” Esca pressed. “You’ve been… quiet. Is your leg hurting?”

Something flashed through his gaze, but it was gone as quickly as the flight of a bird across the path. “Not my leg, Esca.”

“Then what?”

He shook his head and Esca could see him visibly withdrawing further into himself. “It’s nothing.”

Esca’s chest physically hurt at the new tone in his voice. It transported him viscerally back to the early weeks after Esca had first been bought for him, when all he’d done was sit in the chair on the terrace outside his rooms and stare off into the reeds, sinking further and further into his misery and pain. “What causes you pain now, Marcus?”

“Nothing,” he snarled quietly, looking away. “Let it go, Esca.”

With a sigh, Esca stopped pushing, but he couldn't help snatching repeated glances at him as the evening wore to a close. Each time he looked up, the corners of Marcus’ mouth had sunk lower, and the lines between his brows and the tightness around his eyes had etched a little deeper.

After most of the camp had bedded down for the night, save for the warriors on watch, Marcus and Esca lay down side by side as they had grown accustomed to out here in the wild. Long minutes passed until Esca heard Marcus whisper his name in the dark.

He rolled over onto his other side to face him and saw by the light of the dying fires that he was lying on his back, staring straight up at the shifting canopy of leaves above, with a blanket rolled beneath his bad leg again to support it. Normally Marcus slept curled on his side like a child. “What do you need?” he asked.

Marcus’ expression darkened in fleeting frustration at his words. “Nothing. I just… I wanted to ask you if…” He sucked in a short, shallow breath and finished hurriedly, “If you’d rather stay here tomorrow.”

“You want to stay another day before we leave?” Esca asked. “I’m sure they wouldn’t mind, though we’re unlikely to get a second feast, if that’s what you’re after,” he added in an attempt to make his friend smile.

Marcus didn’t smile. “No, you misunderstand me. I will leave tomorrow and head south regardless, but… you’re a free man, Esca. You can go wherever you like. You… You could stay here with your own people.”

“The Selgovae are kind, but they aren’t Brigantes.”

“I know, but… you said yourself a few days ago that you have more in common with these folk than with… with mine. And they’ve taken in strangers before after all. You would have a place here.”

Marcus’ flat intonation and carefully blank expression frightened him. “I promised I wouldn't leave you, Marcus.”

“You promised that as a slave, Esca,” he whispered, as if he hardly dared articulate the words aloud. “I could never hold you to anything you said then.”

“Then let me promise it anew now. I won’t leave you, Marcus. You still need me.”

The Roman’s face twisted into a wry smile and he exhaled. “I do. I suspect I always will. But you don’t need me, Esca. You could be free of Rome for good. You should take it while you can. They would welcome a spear arm like yours, and they are good people.”

Esca’s chest felt like it was imploding.  _ Stop it, Marcus. Stop it, stop it, stop it. _ The words were on the tip of his tongue. He wanted to shake him and scream at him.  _ I do need you, Marcus. I need you. Can’t you see it? I don’t know who I am anymore without you. I’m not Brigantes, I am not Briton, I am not Roman; perhaps I’m just a ghost of all three. _ Careful to keep his voice from quavering, what he said instead was, “If you will let me, I would come with you.”

“If that’s what you truly wish,” Marcus said, voice still oddly hollow. “Then I won’t stop you.”

“Marcus…”

“Goodnight, Esca,” he said, and rolled awkwardly over onto his other side, presenting Esca with the broad bulwark of his back.

Sleep did not come for Esca until the next Selgovae hunters were rising for the new watch in the pre-dawn light.

After a final breakfast of broiled meat and coarse, pot-baked bread, Marcus swung himself awkwardly up into Gallant’s saddle from Esca’s offered leg-up, and he hissed as his right leg settled against the horse’s side. Once the sharpest pain had dissipated, he paused and looked down at Esca.

He offered Esca an expression that made Esca snarl openly.  _ ‘Last chance’ _ , that dark, raised eyebrow said.

With defiant fervour in his eyes, Esca glared and thrust his hand up for Marcus to take.  _ Don’t you dare fucking leave me now, Marcus. _

Sighing, Marcus leaned down, gripping the saddle with his thighs for balance, and took Esca’s arm. The two clasped forearms and Esca sprang up and allowed himself to be tugged aloft by Marcus’ residual strength onto the mare’s back to sit behind him. His arm tingled long after Marcus had let go.

Now that he didn’t need to worry about a half-delirious Marcus slithering off and dropping face-first into a bog, Esca wondered what he should do with his own hands while they rode. He was easily a skilled enough horseman that he could sit behind the lightweight saddle on Gallant’s back and grip with his thighs and calves, but that would eventually get tiring, even for him.

They said their profound thanks and reluctant farewells to the Selgovae and set off south.

As they left the camp, Esca happened to meet the elder woman’s eyes and she looked pointedly at him. Slowly he nodded.  _ I will take care of him, mother,  _ he thought.  _ Even if he doesn’t want me to _ .

Esca kept his hands resting on his thighs while Marcus guided Gallant at a steady walk out of the encampment and on through the whispering woods. 

Neither of them spoke as they went, and with every mile, Esca’s heart sank further and further, uncertainties crowding in on his mind. Did Marcus truly not want him any more? Had that been why he had tried to get him to stay here? After all, as a freedman, as Marcus’ ‘client’, Esca would be even more of a burden now, especially since couldn’t read or write Latin. He could get manual employment of course, and earn his keep well enough, but maybe Marcus simply didn’t want him knocking around any more, serving as a constant reminder of everything this island had taken from him - leg, career, father, honour…

By the evening, their moods were both as black as the looming skies, and they said very little to one another beyond necessary conversation about their direction or when and where to camp.

Esca did not encircle his arms around Marcus’ waist at all, and by the end of each day, his thighs cramped and ached.

With only a couple of days’ ride remaining until they hit the great Roman wall that slashed across the land like a scar, they camped in a hollow set back into a rocky bluff, barely more than a divot in the rockface. It was really only just deep enough to offer a whisker of protection from the vicious wind that had picked up that morning, and from the fleeting squalls of drenching rain that blustered across the heathland, moaning like spirits through the coarse heather.

Gallant stood with her back to the weather and her tail clamped down tight, while Esca scraped together some twisted bits of timber from the lea of the cliff that  _ might  _ take a flame if he built it right. They’d gone without for three nights now on account of the mizzling rain.

Marcus cursed and gingerly eased himself down to sit with his back to the wall of rock, kneading his thumb into the muscle below the newest wound in his thigh and grimacing. His cheeks were grey again, and he had looked a little fevered around the eyes for a couple of days.

Once the puny fire was going, more smoke than light or heat, Esca looked up and felt his shoulders drop. Chalky and pallid beneath the natural olive of his skin, Marcus still looked very frail despite his bulky frame and stern expression. “It’s troubling you,” Esca murmured, and Marcus’ dark gaze flickered over to him.

“No more than usual,” he shrugged, though he didn’t let go of his thigh.

“Let me take care of it for you.”

But Marcus shook his head. “You’re not my slave any more, Esca. I wouldn’t ask things like that of you now.”

“You didn’t ask,” he said, shuffling over and kneeling beside him on the sandy dirt.  _ You won’t ask, will you?  _ “I offered. And stop poking at it like that, or you’ll disturb the healing of the other wound.”

Esca didn’t miss the way Marcus’ full lips twitched slightly at his tone.

He let his hand drop aside and allowed Esca to work the muscle around the old wound, fingers pressing through the fabric of his braccae from knee to thigh. At first Marcus sat there, grim-faced, teeth gritted, leg spasming, and with his eyes rammed shut. A furrow deepened between his brows, but after a few minutes of diligent work, the first knots began to loosen. 

Next moment, he shuddered and went suddenly slack against the rock with a barely-there moan, hands lying limply beside his thighs, letting Esca work the pain loose.

Then he whispered something so softly that it was hardly more than a hiss between his teeth, but Esca caught the sound of his name as clearly as though Marcus had shouted it. Glancing up, Esca saw that his face looked softer now, despite its innately rough-hewn planes and the lingering shadow of illness. His eyes remained closed; long, dark lashes resting butterfly-like on the immeasurably delicate skin beneath his eyes.

Esca also noted the way the man’s braccae had tented ever so slightly at the groin as he worked so he didn’t stray any further up Marcus’ thigh than the line of the old scar beneath. He could have sculpted that scar blindfold onto a clay model of Marcus’ leg after so long tending to him. 

It was only natural for a body long untouched to react like that, he thought.  _ It’s nothing to do with me _ . Marcus didn’t move at all while Esca worked, and even when they both knew the pain had faded, Esca didn’t stop. By the time his hands finally cramped up, Marcus was asleep. And still half-hard.

Drawing the dried meat wrapped in waxed linen from their pack, Esca sat back down beside him, close enough to feel the subtle warmth radiating from him, and nudged him with his shoulder. Marcus twitched awake almost instantly and he blinked a few times before looking round to Esca. When he found him holding out some food, he smiled.

“Thank you,” he mumbled, voice thick, and rough as a handful of gravel. His cold fingers fumbled it as he took it from Esca, and it seemed to take him a while to muster the strength — or the stomach — to consume anything.

Esca just nodded and turned to watch the wind sweeping silver sheets of rain across the heathland below.

That night felt colder even than those they’d spent further north, hunkered down in the heather beside the bluff, and as they huddled together near the remnants of their guttering fire an hour or so later, he could feel Marcus’ bad leg spasming softly again. The man lay on his side, curled into a tight, tense ball of renewed pain beneath the woollen blanket. A few minutes later, Marcus cursed softly.

Esca, who had been lying beside him with his chest facing Marcus’ back, sat up and wordlessly lifted the blanket back from his leg to circle his thumb and fingers over Marcus’ hip and down the band of muscles that stretched to his knee.

This time, it didn’t take long before Marcus’ body caved under Esca’s ministrations, and Marcus groaned softly as his leg relaxed again. “Thank you, Esca,” he whispered. “Lie back before you get cold.”

With a smile, Esca took the liberty of burrowing in a little closer, combining their two blankets one atop the other for extra warmth, and as he smelled the unwashed sweat of Marcus’ body right beneath his nose, Esca was reminded viscerally of hunting expeditions with his people and of the safety of their embrace.

Halfway through the night, while Marcus’ chest steadily rose and fell, Esca snaked his arm around Marcus’ waist and drew himself flush with Marcus’ back. 

He pressed a soft kiss to his shoulder blades and murmured in his own native tongue, “I love you, Marcus Flavius Aquila.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So I looked at the black horse that Marcus rides in the film, and it isn’t a mare, but I decided to make her a mare in this story so that they could maybe breed from her once they set up their little farm eventually… The horses they ride in the book are mares, so I figured it was fine to introduce a horse OC! Also, Romans didn’t have stirrups, so they don’t have stirrups in this. Anything else that’s accurate is probably so by dumb luck rather than through research, though I did look some things up.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Marcus and Esca continue their journey south, meeting some decidedly unfriendly Romans, and then an old acquaintence of Marcus'...

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **Content warning for unwanted advances of a sexual nature (not from Marcus!) towards Esca, but you know our boy would be having none of that... **
> 
> I have ‘borrowed’ heavily from Sutcliff’s text when they reach Vercovicium, and I trust you’ll recognise which bits are hers and which are mine. It was intended as an homage, to keep the spirit of the book in the story at that point. 
> 
> Thank you so much for your comments on the first chapter! I wasn't sure how active the fandom is or how much demand there is for new content, but it seems that my coming in a whole decade too late with Starbucks doesn't seem to matter too much? Thank you for leaving a kudos too if you did!

By the time morning came, they had moved in their sleep.

Marcus now lay on his back, and Esca had actually nestled his head into the hollow of the larger man’s shoulder, arm draped across his stomach while Marcus had his nose buried in Esca’s hair at the crown of his head. Unable to suppress the shudder that ran through him when he realised what was happening, Esca sighed and drew back a little. 

Marcus — painfully honourable — would not want this, no matter how blissful it felt to be pressed so close to him. Besides, if he lay there any longer, he was going to start showing obvious signs of just  _ how  _ good it felt, and he wasn’t sure he could endure that shame, what with Marcus’ complete lack of interest.

Or… not?

Esca made to get up before Marcus awoke and discovered them in such a position, but as Esca tried to move, Marcus grunted in his sleep and tightened the arm that encircled Esca’s shoulders, tugging him back down to sprawl halfway across him this time. Pressed almost hip against hip with him, Esca’s awakening cock found its echo in Marcus’ body. He’d seen Marcus naked in the baths more times than he could count back at Calleva, but he’d never seen him hard. From what he could feel now, Marcus would be huge.

That… didn’t help matters. At all. 

Heat coiled in his belly but the ground beneath them was freezing, and if Esca’s body was aching all over from the seeping chill, he knew Marcus would be in agony if they remained there much longer. “Marcus, we need to move…” he said. “It’s too cold.”

Marcus grunted softly, not coming awake with the usual sharp reactions of a soldier.

Beneath him, Esca was now  _ inescapably  _ aware of Marcus’ morning hardness and it sent his own blood rushing south and pooling in his groin despite his best efforts. It was becoming difficult to think straight. “Marcus,” Esca snarled, desperately trying to extricate himself from Marcus’ arm and their tangled blankets without causing too much fuss, and without kneeing Marcus in his bad leg. Or the dick. 

With a barely-there sigh, Marcus released him and opened his eyes.

Instead of the embarrassment he’d fully expected from the Roman, Esca found only a playful fondness in the man’s eyes, and perhaps a note of something else, something indecipherable in the half-light of dawn. Silently, Marcus nodded, and they got on with their morning routine without a word said about the previous night, or the manner in which they had apparently spent it.

In total it would probably take them a week to get to the border from the Selgovae encampment, but before they gained it, they came to a small garrison north of the Wall that Marcus said was named Habitancum.

Esca never imagined he’d be grateful to see another Roman building ever again, but his heart lifted just a little when they crested a rise and saw the wooden-walled fort squatting low and compact in the landscape. They might be able to rest at this remote, northern garrison for the night, and ride straight for the Wall in the morning. Marcus had started to sway in the saddle as the afternoon wore on, and his leg needed proper rest, not the cold, unforgiving stone of the ground.

Esca’s hope evaporated, however, when Marcus had to yell his name three times at the soldiers stationed there before they would even let the bedraggled pair come within bow range, let alone open the gates for them. They were permitted to refresh their water skins and give Gallant a break, but Esca’s hackles rose at the stares they garnered from the bored soldiers stationed there. Naively oblivious and trusting as usual, Marcus slid down after Esca from the saddle and snatched at Esca’s shoulder to steady himself as the pain jolted up his leg on impact.

While he disappeared to speak in private with the garrison commander, he left Esca in the main yard with Gallant, and the precious Eagle wrapped in a cloak amongst their things.

Esca felt the men’s eyes on him as he stood with his back to them and loosened Gallant’s girth to make her more comfortable while they paused, and the nape of his neck prickled. Perhaps picking up on his unease, Gallant whickered softly and stamped her front hoof, tossing her head and making the simple bit and bridle jangle.

“Shh, love,” he murmured in his own language. “Easy.”

They could see his clipped ear, he was sure of it. No amount of freedom granted would ever grow that back, and his hatred for Rome etched itself a little deeper in his heart. 

At the heavy tread of Roman boots behind him, he turned and defiantly stared the approaching man down. 

“What’s a native dog like you doing heading south to cross the Wall, eh? Slave?” the soldier leered at him.

“I’m not a slave,” he said very quietly in perfect, if lightly accented Latin. “I am a freedman.”

“Ooohh,” a second soldier cooed in a mocking falsetto which vanished like a flashing knife as he stepped right up to Esca’s face and growled, “I don’t believe you, little man.” 

His breath was truly foul and Esca had to fight the urge to step back. He wasn’t about to give any ground to these stinking thugs though, so he set his shoulders and jaw and glared up at the soldier. It was a look that had frequently made Marcus back down and do as he was told in their early days -- and once or twice up here too -- but it wasn’t going to work here. There were too many of them, and Esca was too small. Well, if they thought he was going to be easy pickings because of his size, they could bloody well think again. Even a ferret can bite hard enough to take a finger off if you get close enough. 

The second man looked around at his fellow soldiers, all bored and looking for something to toy with, and said, “How about I borrow you from your master for a little while, and we show a filthy  _ cinaedus  _ like you what you're really good for?”

Esca had drawn the blade from his belt, bringing point to pulse, before the man could even blink in surprise. “How about I gut you from chin to crotch instead?” he hissed through clenched teeth. “You’ll find it harder to fuck someone with your insides dangling out.”

Marcus appeared at his shoulder a heartbeat later but he simply stood there, looming, staring the man down with quiet fury in his green eyes while Esca held the tip of the knife to his quivering throat.

They did not spend the night at the dingy garrison, and they did not speak of what had occurred there.

Finally, blessedly, the solid line of the Wall reared up in the distance from the dusk pooling heavy around them. “Vercovicium,” Marcus guessed. “Thank the gods.”

The wind lashed mercilessly at the pair as they rode Gallant up the twisting line of a stream in the glen below the fort, the gale snatching at their cloaks and tugging at the mare’s tangled tail. Marcus swayed again and this time Esca felt no compunctions about gripping him firmly about the middle. Marcus was too tired even to acknowledge him, and they pressed on as night gathered around them.

Torches danced and flickered along the wall ahead, and a guard bearing one of them paused on his patrol, perhaps thinking he’d heard their approach below in the blackness.

The North Gate loomed through the full dark as Gallant’s hooves rang on the cobblestone road, and Marcus drew himself up, mustering the last of his strength. “Open in Caesar’s name!” he yelled, surprising Esca with the strength of it.  _ There  _ was Marcus the centurion.

It took some infuriating bickering back and forth between the fort’s optio and Marcus himself, but eventually the gate creaked open and Gallant walked herself in as if this were the Emperor’s stables and she his most expensive horse. Esca, too tired to steer her, gave the mare her head, and focused on not letting Marcus topple sideways out of the saddle onto the stones below.

Marcus dismounted after Esca did. “Bring the Eagle but keep it wrapped,” he murmured, and Esca nodded. Anyone else might have thought Marcus was giving him an order, but Marcus was trusting him with the greatest treasure he had, and that was enough for Esca.

Knowing full well how wild they looked, with a week’s worth of beard growth, and their faces etched with exhaustion, Marcus squared his shoulders and took a deep breath in through his nose. “Optio, I wish to see the Commanding Officer immediately.” His voice rasped and his eyes fluttered but he held himself straight as if he were on parade.

“Ugh…?” the optio asked, blinking at the stark contradiction between the man’s calm demands and feral appearance.

He must have seen something of the soldier in Marcus then — Esca could certainly see it now in the set of his shoulders and the careful articulation of his Latin consonants — because they found themselves being led by torchlight through seemingly endless alleys and between squat, stone buildings, until they reached a warmly-lit room, and Marcus sighed.

Esca subtly pressed the wrapped bundle into his hands as Marcus drew himself up again, leg trembling perilously beneath him.

“Yes, what —?” the man rising from a camp chair inside began.

Something in Marcus’ demeanour changed when he regarded the garrison commander, and Esca bristled, tense and wary, but Marcus just chuckled softly. “Good evening to you, Drusillus,” he said dryly. “My congratulations to you on — your promotion.”

If he’d intended it as a light, conversational opening, it fell flat. The centurion seemed puzzled, and Marcus’ fleeting jollity wavered.

“Do you not know me, Drusillus?” he croaked, a pleading note in his voice. “I am —”

The centurion started forward with a bark of delighted laughter and exclaimed, “Aquila!”

Esca’s shoulders sagged and Marcus swayed again, to be stabilised by Esca’s hand on the small of his back. His wool cloak was sodden and beneath it he was shaking from the cold or the strain of staying on his feet. Esca fought the rising urge to demand this thick-skulled centurion offer his apparently ‘old’ friend a seat.

Drusillus rounded the corner of his desk, blurting, “What in the name of Thunder brings you here of all places?”

Marcus fumbled the cloth-wrapped Eagle in his frozen hands and stepped forward to meet him, setting their burden down on the centurion’s desk.

“We have brought back the Hispana’s lost Eagle,” he slurred, and before Esca or Drusillus could catch him, his knees gave way and he very quietly crumpled forward on top of it.

Out of the two of them, Esca was quickest, and he managed to break his friend’s fall before he dashed his forehead open on the wood of the desk, and the centurion was at his side a heartbeat later.

“By Jupiter, look at the state of you both,” he hissed, calling over his shoulder for his optio. A second later, Drusillus flung the filthy blanket back over the Eagle on the desk and muttered to Esca, “Best to keep that a secret for now, I think.”

Esca nodded gratefully, and eased the weight of Marcus’ collapsed body down onto the floor between them, cushioning his head on his thigh. Esca unclasped Marcus’ sodden cloak and let it flop open onto the flagstones beneath him like a wet rag.

“Sir?” an uncertain voice called from the doorway.

“Send for the surgeon,” Drusillus barked.

The centurion gave Marcus his own room, and between them, they carried Marcus to the bed. “I will care for him,” Esca murmured as he took off Marcus’ wet boots. His feet were like chunks of ice inside the sodden socks, and Esca’s heart went out to the bullheaded idiot. If the weather didn’t finish him off, his own stubborn pride would for certain. 

“You are his… slave?” Drusillus asked hesitantly.

“Freedman,” Esca corrected without taking his eyes from Marcus’ face.

“Forgive me,” Drusillus said. “Marcus always said he had no wish to keep a slave.”

“He did? How do you know him?”

Drusillus’ eyes flickered to Marcus’ face. “We served together at Isca Dumnoniorum. I was there when he was hurt.” He shook his head, expression turning from pitying to starkly grim. “Bloody miracle he survived. I’ve never seen anything like it.” Drusillus added with a quick snarl, “The man who ran him over was his friend; man named Cradoc. But Marcus faced down an entire chariot charge with nothing but a single spear. Saved the whole bloody garrison, he did.” 

Esca’s chest swelled as he pictured it, though he couldn’t help noticing that the name Drusillus had mentioned was British. Marcus had made friends with a Briton before then, and had been betrayed. No  _ wonder  _ he had looked so hurt when Esca had seemed to turn on him among the Seal People. Guilt gnawed afresh at his insides, and he wished he’d  _ known _ . He might not have been able to act any differently, but at least… he would have known. 

He had heard the story of Marcus’ injury in parts, though not from anyone who had seen it first hand and certainly not from Marcus himself, and he swallowed, realising he’d been quiet for a long time. “That sounds like Marcus,” he mumbled, rocking where he stood.

“You should rest as well,” Drusillus remarked. “You look like one stiff breeze would knock you down.”

Nodding, Esca sank down beside Marcus on the bed. His fingers found their way into Marcus’ limp hand. He squeezed.  _ I’m sorry _ . In that moment, staring at Marcus’ pallid face, he renewed his private vow to protect Marcus and see him home safely once again. 

After the surgeon had cleaned and wrapped Marcus’ wounded, puffy leg again, and after Esca had given them both the most perfunctory of wipe-downs with a cloth and warm water from a copper basin that had been brought in for them, he felt no shame in simply clambering into the narrow bed beside Marcus and passing out beside him. After all, they had slept almost in each other’s arms for weeks now to ward off the cold and the weather and, perhaps, the looming fear just a little. 

Dawn crept in slowly and stirred Esca from the deepest sleep he could remember. Beneath him, the ground was soft, and the air seemed fusty somehow. Jerking awake, he sat up and realised a few pounding heartbeats later that they were not on some gods-forsaken stretch of heathland anymore, but in the safety of a Roman fort. 

“Gods,” he laughed to himself under his breath. “Never thought I’d be calling a Roman fort ‘safe’.”

Beside him, drawn by the sound of his voice, Marcus shifted and stirred, blinking awake. “Esca?” he croaked. “What… What happened?”

Esca turned where he still sat upright in the bed and looked down at Marcus. “You gave your friend Drusillus quite the surprise last night by presenting him with the Eagle, and then immediately passing out on top of it.”

“Oh.” Marcus’ cheeks heated and Esca found himself heartened by the rising colour. 

Then Marcus noticed the room they were in, and some of the colour drained away again when his eyes landed on the armour stand in the corner of the room. Beside it Esca noted twin sets of fresh tunics had also been laid out for them on a chest while they slept. 

“This is a centurion’s quarters,” Marcus breathed, sitting up on his elbows with a grunt.

“Look familiar then?” Esca asked, studying Marcus intently. This was an environment in which he had never witnessed Marcus after all. 

“Intimately,” Marcus breathed, and Esca couldn't tell if he was appalled to find himself back in such quarters or just surprised. “Though it’s a bit smaller than mine was at Isca,” he chuckled. And then he looked up at Esca. “What time is it?”

“Dawn, or thereabouts,” he hedged.

“You stayed here all night?” Marcus asked with a soft smile. 

Esca flushed and looked away. “Too tired to find somewhere else,” he mumbled, and threw the covers back enough to slide out of bed. 

From behind him he thought he heard Marcus murmur, “I don’t mind.” 

It became decidedly more and more jarring to see Marcus in this military setting. 

While Marcus and Drusillus talked effortlessly together over breakfast in the centurion’s study, Esca remained mostly silent. To his surprise though, he was treated by Drusillus as Marcus’ equal, and in return he answered politely whenever Marcus directed Drusillus’ attention to him for more details on their adventures. 

Once the stories had run dry, Marcus and Drusillus drifted naturally off topic to talk of their time at Isca before the attack, and Esca lost interest. That was a Marcus from a different time; a Roman soldier sent to subdue Britons and kill them if necessary.  _ And yet _ , a small voice in Esca’s head reminded him,  _ he tried to befriend them first _ . Marcus was a good man first, and a soldier of Rome second. 

After he’d finished eating, Esca touched Marcus on the shoulder during a natural lull in the conversation and asked, “Where can I find Gallant? I want to check on her. That hind hoof was hotter than I’d have liked yesterday…”

Marcus looked to Drusillus, who gave Esca clear instructions to the stables, and Esca offered a polite nod to both men and left them to their reminiscing.

The Romans at Vercovicium could not have been more different from those at Habitancum. Though clearly curious about a Briton wandering through their midst, they greeted Esca politely as he strode with feigned confidence towards the stables. There Gallant greeted him with a friendly whicker, and he chatted a while with the stable master, who seemed very interested in acquiring the mare.

“Sorry,” Esca said, rubbing his knuckles fondly over her velvety nose while she nibbled curiously at him and laved her rough tongue over his palm, seeking the salt no doubt. “She’s not for sale. Besides, we need her to get us back to Calleva.”

“Fair enough,” the man laughed. He was a stocky man with dark features and bright, expressive eyes, and as much curly hair on his head as on his chest, if what was curling out of the top of his tunic was anything to go by. “Can’t blame a man for trying, eh?”

Esca inclined his head and slipped into the stall to give their horse a once-over.

By the time he returned to the centurion’s building, the sun was up and the soldiers were running drills in the main yard, sunlight flashing on bared steel. The clatter and clangour of it all was frankly overwhelming after nothing but the wailing of the wind and the steady, syncopated hoofbeats of Gallant’s walk for so long. 

As they clashed blades with each other or lunged at wooden dummies, Esca’s heart pounded. It was like they weren’t even human. When his father’s spears had trained, there had been laughter and jollity, joking and jibing as men and women jostled each other to the ground and staves clacked together with a rhythm almost like a dance. Here there was none of that; only cold, ruthless efficiency. It made him feel sick.

But then, standing in the doorway of Drusillus’ building, soaking up the sunshine, Esca spotted Marcus. He leaned his shoulder on the doorframe with his arms crossed over his chest, showing the chiselled muscles of his biceps in the simple tunic, and he had tilted his face up towards the miraculously clear sky. 

The light glanced along his jawline like the edge of a blade, and Esca’s mouth went suddenly dry. He looked relaxed and comfortable for the first time in months and it made something ugly twist in his stomach; Marcus felt at home here.

Esca slowed his approach and studied him a little more closely. Although he was still pale and a little gaunt, the olive hue of his skin beneath was clearly Roman, his features strong and foreign but exquisitely beautiful. His full lips were softly parted, his eyes closed, his stance carefully relaxed.

“Marcus?” he said as he drew nearer, and his friend opened his eyes and smiled at him. It was a free, open smile that struck Esca in the gut.

“There you are,” he murmured, stepping out onto the flagstones of the yard a pace to greet him and unfolding his impressive arms. 

Esca had always liked Marcus’ shoulders in particular. He also had freckles there that spread invitingly up his neck. 

“How’s Gallant?” Marcus asked.

“Sound as ever,” Esca replied, swallowing thickly. “And you?”

“Far from sound, I’m afraid,” he said, shooting a look down at his bandaged right leg, “But sound enough to move south again. It’ll be a long ride to Eboracum, but the roads will make the going easier now, and we can stay in military  _ mansiones _ from here on instead of bunking down among the heather.”

“Do we need coin for that?” Esca asked, leaning his weight against the wall of Drusillus’ building and folding his arms protectively across his chest, which was hurting for no good reason. In the summer, these stones would be warmed by the sun, but now they were a chill, steadying presence against his back.

Beside him, Marcus sagged once more against the doorway and shook his head. “We shouldn’t for a  _ mansio _ , but just in case, Drusillus has given us a loan which we are to pay back to the garrison at Calleva when we get there.”

“Your uncle will pay it?”

“I will,” he said. “I received no small amount when they discharged me after this,” he said, gingerly swinging his right leg a few inches off the ground. “It will more than cover the amount we need to sleep comfortably, and there are a few villas which might offer a son of Rome shelter as we go anyway.”

“What about a son of Britain?” he asked bitterly. 

“Him too,” Marcus grinned. “He’s the real hero after all.”

Esca scoffed and looked away. 

He didn’t welcome the idea of staying with Romans they didn’t know, but even he had to admit that it was infinitely preferable to sleeping under the elements in their current state of exhaustion, and besides, he trusted Marcus.

Marcus’ farewell to Drusillus the following day was fond, and it made something crack in Esca to see Marcus so open, so tactile, after months and months of only reserved, fleeting contact. It served to illustrate the gulf between them, between Roman and Briton, and it made Esca withdraw within himself as they set off. 

In many ways, he’d come to see Marcus not as another faceless Roman in a bristling helmet, but simply as his  _ friend _ , but their short stay at the fort had served to remind him of the persistence of the former fact. 

To their surprise, the stable master had been authorised to loan them another horse to ease the burden on their dear Gallant. Marcus remained on mild-mannered Gallant under the pretence of her being easier on his leg, which was also largely true, while Esca took the feisty young gelding’s training as his project for the rest of the journey south.

It soon became apparent why they’d been keen to get rid of the gelding. Wilful and awkward, he tossed his head and jogged on the spot instead of walking out nicely, and he took an instant hatred to Gallant, biting and kicking out when he could. 

“No wonder they didn’t want him as a cavalry horse,” Marcus scowled. “Couldn’t keep him in a formation like that.” 

But Esca felt Marcus’ eyes on him as he worked on the horse even as they travelled, and tried not to preen when the gelding -- whom they refused to honour with a name -- started to behave himself. After all, Esca had backed many horses under his father’s watchful eye, and he knew how to handle a spirited mount like this one. He would have the bay trotting in neat, tidy circles by the time they reached Eboracum.

It was on a clear, sunny, winter day, however, just as the sun reached its zenith four days after leaving Vercovicium, that they rode without his realising it into the heartland of Brigantes territory.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hope you're enjoying it!! Sorry for the slight cliff-hanger, but that chapter got way too long and unwieldy, so I decided to split it there... More on the way soon if you like it and let me know with a comment/kudos!


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Part Two of the previous chapter. Esca continues to learn that just because Marcus has said he's free, doesn't mean that everyone else accepts this. Next time, they head south and pause at the battlefield where the last of the Brigantes stood against the tide of Roman soldiers... Buckle up for the feels, folks!
> 
> *content warnings in this chapter for non-consensual sexual advances/contact/comments. No rape though*

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks a million to those who've commented on this, or popped over to Tumblr! You're the reason I'm continuing to post!

Esca’s world slid suddenly sideways as the profile of a hill caught his eye in the distance and he nearly slipped from his gelding’s back in shock.

“Esca?” Marcus asked mere moments later, reining Gallant closer to him. “What’s wrong?”

Esca’s ears rang and he hardly heard Marcus’ words. 

Eight and a half years spent as a slave in the south, and it felt like no time at all as he stared at the husk of a lightning-blasted oak on the side of the road where he and his little brother had once played, waiting for their father and older brother to join them on a hunt. Memories drifted like spiralling autumn leaves through his mind and he could do nothing but blink to drive them away.

“Esca, you've gone the colour of week-old barley-meal…”

“I… Nothing…” he panted, his torso heaving as his chest tightened around his heart and lungs. He could barely even hear Marcus’ voice. “I… know this land, that’s all.”

“Shit,” Marcus hissed and then Esca did look at him. Marcus’ eyes had gone wide and his lips were parted in unmistakable horror. “The Brigantes, Esca — your people — they… they live around Eboracum…”

“ _ Lived _ , Marcus. Lived. They’re all dead now, or scattered to the wind.”

Marcus looked like Esca felt. “I’m so sorry. I should have thought…”

“It’s fine. Let’s just keep moving.”

The high walls of Eboracum slowly drew into view two hours later, and Esca finally let out a long breath. If he staggered as he slid off his mount, then Marcus didn’t comment.

Their stay at the Sixth Legion’s headquarters proved surprisingly short, and it was not without incident.

The legate had been astonished and delighted to hear of the Eagle’s recovery, and he summoned in a whole horde of people to celebrate with a feast at Claudius Hieronimianus’ villa on the outskirts of the town, including, to Esca’s disdain, Claudius’ odious little tribune, Servius Placidus.

From the moment they landed on him, Esca felt Placidus’ eyes on him the whole time, and he quietly cursed whoever had seen fit to place him beside the man to the darkest pits of the Other Side.

Reclining while eating was a most uncomfortable sensation.  _ If the gods had wanted us to eat lying down, they’d have formed us like snakes _ , he thought sourly. As he propped himself up on one elbow on the deep cushions between Marcus and Placidus, he felt his stomach roll unpleasantly.

“Perhaps you will be rewarded with the command of a newly-reformed Ninth, Marcus?” Claudius beamed, drunkenly slapping Marcus on the back.

“I’m not sure the life of a soldier is quite for me anymore, Claudius,” Marcus said with only the slightest hitch to his voice. “I’m sure there are plenty who could do the job more admirably than I, should Rome decide to reform the legion.”

Beside Esca, Placidus sneered into his wine cup, jealousy writ plain in his too-bright eyes. 

The man might have been a snivelling politician, but Esca could recall that night so many months ago when he’d proudly told them all at Calleva that he’d once wanted nothing more than the glory and fame of a soldier’s life.  _ You wouldn't even have lasted through your first training drill _ , Esca mused, though he kept that to himself. 

As if drawn by his snide thoughts, Placidus’ head snapped up again and he curled his lip at Esca. “You seem to think you’ve come out of all this rather well, don’t you, Briton?” he hissed out of the corner of his mouth, pointedly eyeing the spot where Esca had been placed at Marcus’ side. Even as a freedman, Esca should probably not have been shown such honour, especially when someone as socially significant as Placidus was in attendance, but honestly, Esca didn't give a single raw rat’s arse for all this Roman posturing.

The Briton just raised an eyebrow at the tribune.

Beside him, oblivious to Esca’s growing discomfort, Marcus remained locked in conversation with Claudius to his right.

“Oh yes,” Placidus went on in a dangerous undertone, “You must be  _ very  _ pleased with yourself, you little weasel.” Leaning close, Placidus actually had the audacity to lay his hand on Esca’s thigh and grip the rangy muscle tightly.

Esca jerked back in surprise and revulsion, and knocked Marcus’ elbow as he went to drink. The movement caused Marcus’ wine cup to slop its dark contents over his new, white toga. “Esca!” he laughed, turning. “Steady on.” When he saw the look on Esca’s face, his expression shattered. “What’s wrong?”

“Nothing,” he chirped, not wanting to cause a scene after Marcus had so recently won back his family’s honour and good name. “I… I’m sorry. I must have had too much to drink. Alas, your Roman food is still too rich for my poor ‘savage’ stomach,” he said, self-deprecation lying heavy in his tone.

It made his insides roil to hear the snickering laughs his words garnered from the surrounding Romans, though it earned nothing at all from Marcus.

“I think I will retire to my room, if I may?” He had no intention of going to his rooms just yet, but he had to get out of the  _ triclinium  _ with its sickly wine and strange food and clammy, wandering hands.

“You’re a free man,” Marcus proclaimed with evident pride, though the light didn’t go all the way to his eyes. Concern pinched them tight at the corners. “You may do as you please.”

Esca nodded, briefly closing his eyes as he rose. He didn't need to be looking at the man to know that Placidus was watching him go like a hawk sitting on the gloves of a falconer.

Out in the water garden at the rear of the house, Esca stared up at the constellations glimmering above the flower beds, and sighed. The Romans had different names for these stars from what he knew, but these were  _ his  _ skies —  _ Brigantes’  _ skies — and his whole heart hurt. What would his people -- his family -- say if they could see him now? Would they understand, or would they despise him for his weakness in bowing to Rome.

_ You never bowed before _ , Esca told himself with a wry little sigh.  _ Before Marcus, no master in seven years had made you bow, no matter what he did. And is it such a shame in the end to swear oneself to one good Roman, but not to Rome herself? Is that even possible? _

For a long time he stood there with only the soft susurrations of the leaves and the lapping of water for company.

“What am I even doing?” he asked the empty night, not quite aware that he was speaking Latin.

“Something I could have asked as well,” came an unpleasantly familiar voice from right behind him.

He jumped, taken off guard by the tribune’s silent approach over the marble terrace.  _ Silent like the snake in the grass, you are, _ Esca thought. “What do you want?” he snapped, turning to face him, body taut and ready like a couched spear, despite the rich food lying heavy in his stomach.

“You have not been brought before a magistratus,” Placidus purred, pristine toga draped over a limp wrist. “You are not a libertus yet,  _ boy _ . And I will have your deference. You were quite rude to me back there.”

“You will have  _ nothing  _ from me,” Esca spat.

Placidus shot a look at Esca’s scarred, clipped ear and snorted, “Do not presume to speak to me like that,  _ servus _ . You could never be my equal, nor that of your precious master.” He laughed as the heat rose in Esca’s cheeks at the insult. “Did you think I didn’t notice the way you look at him? Fawning over him like you can’t wait for him to bend you over and split you open? Does he take you often, I wonder? Does he show you your rightful place?”

Esca saw red, but something,  _ somehow _ , held him back from throttling the silk-clad pig where he stood. If he lashed out now, even in self-defence, Esca could very well be taken from Marcus for good, and Marcus’ newly-minted honour would be tarnished. Placidus was not some nameless soldier at a distant border fort, to be warded off with a knife and a few course threats, but a soft and important Roman tribune.

Esca swallowed bile and glared at Placidus, shaking all over with impotent rage.

“Or perhaps he doesn’t,  _ servus _ , and you only  _ wish  _ he would,” Placidus snickered, bringing his clammy fingers up to Esca’s chin and tilting his face up like he was checking the teeth of a horse at market. 

No. Like he was inspecting a  _ slave  _ at market. 

The urge to bite his soft-skinned fingers off flared overwhelmingly strong, and Esca bared his teeth like a wolf. 

“I think perhaps,” Placidus whispered in his ear, “That I will make you my  _ cinaedus  _ for the evening, and you will take it like the little savage you are.”

Esca snarled like a cornered fox as he heard that nasty Roman word again, but Placidus only smirked and tightened his grip on Esca’s jaw, contorting Esca’s lips and cheeks grotesquely as he angled his face still further to expose his throat and pounding pulse. 

Esca’s whole body trembled with the strain of holding himself back from punching the man in the gut. Or worse. He could do it. One quick twist, and Placidus would drop to the stones, silent and limp and broken as a forgotten doll. 

“Strike me, dog…” Placidus warned coolly, “Object in any way, and I will have you executed for the insult, Eagle or no. What shame you would bring on your master, then, hmm?”

A sudden movement behind the tribune’s shoulder drew Esca’s eyes, and he barely had time to register who had emerged from the villa before Marcus himself had hauled Placidus bodily into the air by his toga and slammed his back against the stone wall of the house with a roar. 

“You dare touch him?” he bellowed with his huge fists clenched at Placidus’ shoulders, scrunching the expensive wool so hard it was in danger of ripping. “Threaten him?”

“He’s still a slave, Marcus,” Placidus purred obsequiously, though he looked terrified beneath his veneer of disdain. “You know that as well as I. Seems you neglected to inform him of the proper procedure.”

“He is  _ free _ ,” Marcus growled into his face. “And even if he were still a slave, which he is not, he would belong to  _ me _ , Placidus. He would be mine.  _ Mine _ . He would never belong to you!”

Like the fabled lions. of which Marcus had once spoken during their half-frozen nights in the north, Marcus now  _ roared  _ in his defence, and Esca’s knees went almost slack. For an odd, disjointed moment, it felt like Esca was back in the gorge with Liathan’s axe bearing down on him. Marcus had caught the blow at the last possible second with his blade, drawing Liathan away from Esca, giving him time to get his breath and his footing back. 

Forget the injury to his leg; this man was a titan — sculpted bronze and flashing steel — and Placidus’ already pallid skin had gone grey in the face of Marcus’ anger.

“Get out of my sight,” Marcus rumbled like approaching thunder. “Before I throw you out into the street.”

Placidus made what was probably the wisest decision of his life, and left.

For a long time, Marcus stood, breathing heavily through his nose like a blooded bull, muscles and tendons visibly straining in neck, a vein at his throat pulsing. Eventually Esca moved, closing the distance between them and resting his fingertips on Marcus’ bare forearm. 

He ducked his head to catch his friend’s gaze and was relieved when he found clarity behind the fading fury in his eyes. “Marcus?”

Slowly, very slowly, Marcus closed those eyes and shuddered beneath Esca’s hand.

He lowered his forehead down to meet Esca’s and exhaled. “Did he hurt you?” he asked, bringing his palm to Esca’s chest, right over his pounding heart. 

The gesture was oddly intimate, and Esca’s voice caught as he answered. “No.”

“Did he touch you?”

“Only my face.”

At that, Marcus growled, turned away, and took a limping half-step towards the door through which Placidus had only recently vanished.

Esca shot out a hand and grabbed the Roman’s thick-boned wrist in his bird-like fingers. “Marcus, leave it,” he hissed, and the soldier stilled all over again. “Please. He’s not worth it. You’ve just won back your honour with the return of the Eagle. Let it lie.”

He nodded once, but to his surprise a moment later, Marcus twisted out of Esca’s grip and stalked away, leaving him alone on the terrace once more.

The sounds of the party continued long into the night, but no one came to look for Esca, and well after midnight, he slunk off to his borrowed cubiculum and curled up in a ball beneath the thin sheets and fine woollen blankets.

That night he dreamed of Marcus’ big, rough hands on his body, first gripping him hard by the hips and then worshipping him with his lips, his tongue, and his hands from thighs to neck. 

Vague sensations, like the wet heat of Marcus’ mouth on his cock, filled his mind, and he woke alone with the dawn, achingly hard.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next time, Marcus and Esca ride south and their friendship deepens further as Esca opens up to Marcus about his past. And they unexpectedly meet some Brigantes... Stay tuned for more, and leave me a kudos if you're enjoying it or, still better, a comment!


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Esca and Marcus make their way south west from Eboracum and find themselves back at the wide meadow where the Romans once marched to battle against the Brigantes. There they encounter ghosts both old and new...

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here's the next part for you! Hope you enjoy it. Thank you so much for the kudos and comments so far! Things will start to get fluffier from here on in... I promise...

“Esca?”

“Huh?” 

He twitched in the saddle as they left Claudius’ house after breaking their fast together, mercifully alone, and turned their horses to join the wide  _ via praetoria  _ that led to the South Gate of the city. 

“Sorry. I wasn’t listening.”

Marcus puffed out his cheeks and let loose a shaky laugh. Oddly, it seemed as though he’d used up his reserves of courage in uttering his question the first time, and asking it again was going to take more strength than he had.

Never one to back down though, swallowing, Marcus said, “I asked if you’d like to make a detour through your people’s lands before we head south... You may not get another chance for a while, if… if you still intend to come back with me to Calleva, that is.” He paused and added, “Our initial route to Caledonia took us too far east to go through Brigantes’ lands, I think.”

What he left unsaid was that Esca had been a  _ slave  _ when Marcus had brought him this way the first time, and he probably hadn’t trusted him not to bolt like a leveret for the hills the moment he saw something he recognised.

_ Did  _ he want to see it though? 

Part of him ached to ride the familiar paths that Esca and his brothers had charged along on their stocky mounts, laughing and whooping, goading one another on. The other half of him hardened itself instantly against the idea, recalling only the stench of death; the cloying mix of blood and earth in his nose and mouth on awakening in the freezing water of a small stream after the battle.

The shock of Marcus’ question wiped his mind blank, and all he could hear was the pounding of his blood in his ears and the ring of iron horseshoes on the cobbles. 

Eventually he simply said, “I don’t know.”

Marcus nodded. When Esca gave no more response, Marcus spoke again, his voice carefully neutral, “There’s a road that arcs west into what was Brigantes’ lands, before it turns south and eventually arrives at the town of Ratae. It’s… It’s one of the routes we can take. Or…” he faltered when he realised that Esca looked vaguely sick, “Or we could go further east, through Parisi lands and down to Lindum the way we came before.”

“The Gabrantovices live that way,” Esca murmured to himself, mind still reeling wildly. “They betrayed my father to Rome in return for peace. I would rather not go that way, now I know that would be our route.”

“West it is then?”

“Marcus, I… I don't know if…”  _ if I have the strength for this _ .

Hearing the rest of his sentence hanging unspoken in the air between them, Marcus nodded. “I’ll be with you,” he said. “Whatever you decide — to linger for a few days or to ride hard for Ratae — I’ll be with you. You decide.”

Taking a very slow inhale, Esca bowed his head but said nothing as they turned their horses south west. He had no idea how he would feel when they came to that place, that other sacred killing ground where this time, British blood had soaked the soil instead of Roman.

Tumbling hills gave way to dense woodland, and after a morning’s ride, the thing that Esca had been dreading finally happened. He knew these woods  _ intimately  _ now. He knew that that right fork led uphill to a freezing cold tarn, while that one twisted down to a favourite haunt of deer in the summer, shaded by tall beeches and watered by a clear stream.

He had ridden down this stretch of road on that final, bright morning, when the Romans had come marching up it from Eboracum like a thousand gleaming ants - unstoppable in number, discipline, and brutality. He retched a little and tasted acid in his mouth. “Marcus… we’re… we’re getting close to where… to where it happened.”

“Do you want to turn aside and stop a while when we reach it?”

He’d been thinking on that question ever since Marcus had brought all this up, and silently he nodded, chewing the inside of his cheek to keep from crying.

And then there it was.

To the right of the road stretched the wide meadow flanked by woodland where he had stood beside his father and his older brother, and made their last stand against the Romans. 

There, further up the meadow, and only a few minutes further back in time, his mother had knelt before her husband beneath the reaching branches of an elm tree. There, she had tilted her face to him, smiling encouragingly even as they both wept, and her three sons had looked on in horror. His younger brother, only seven, had pissed himself at the sight of it. He’d been dead himself two hours later.

The horses halted on the hard-packed road of their own accord, as if sensing their riders’ growing tension. 

After a breath, Esca slid unsteadily from his saddle and simply dropped the reins to the dirt. Alone, he brushed through the tall, rough grasses. Were the stems darker now than they had been a decade ago, nurtured by the blood of the Brigantes who had died here? No. Of course not. He was just imagining it. 

In fact, it all looked so  _ ordinary _ . 

The clearing lay so still now, so quiet, so peaceful, as if nothing had ever happened here; as if the ground had swallowed the screams and the blood and the corpses and left nothing but pure, pristine earth behind. Perhaps he’d got the wrong meadow? He had almost expected the bleached skeletons still to be lying where they’d fallen -- to look as it did in his nightmares -- bodies picked clean by carrion birds, with spears standing aloft into the sky like broken bones, and torques glittering gold in the sun, but there was nothing but empty peace and whispering grasses.

The small stream that bisected the field had run red with his people’s lifeblood, but with time it had also washed the blood clean from the land.  _ Take the hurt with you _ , Esca wished silently as he waded through it, heedless of the way it soaked his thinning boots. On a whim, he paused on the far bank and looked back to the road to find that Marcus had picked up the gelding’s reins and was standing there quietly, watching him.

Esca beckoned him over and turned to make his way upstream to the small kink in the riverbank that still haunted his sleep. There, on that innocuous patch of grass, his father had fallen to a Roman gladius, never to stir again.

It took Marcus a while to traverse the rough ground with the two horses in tow, but eventually Esca heard the splash of water as their hooves and Marcus’ boots forded the stream. The three of them came to stand at a short distance behind Esca on the bank. 

“I didn’t like to intrude,” Marcus said, a slight colour in his cheeks. “Roman boots on sacred ground…”

Esca managed a weak, grateful smile. “This is where my father died,” he said, gesturing.

Marcus’ expression fell and he stared at the unremarkable patch of grass as if examining a gravestone. “I shouldn’t be here, Esca.” He made no move to leave though, and seemed to be waiting for Esca to send him away. Esca could have kissed him for that alone. 

Instead, he set his jaw and blinked away tears. He  _ needed  _ Marcus to see this. He needed him to understand somehow. This was where  _ everything  _ had changed in the course of a single day; in the span of only a few hours. 

He also just needed Marcus. He needed Marcus’ strength now, as Marcus had needed his in the north. Esca’s whole body began to shake with a tension he couldn't bring himself to let go. Mere heartbeats later, Marcus switched both the horses’ reins to his left hand, freeing his right, and took Esca’s fingers in his, squeezing so hard it almost hurt.

A lifetime ago now, it seemed, Esca and he had sat huddled on opposite sides of their puny, miserable campfire, and Esca had told him matter-of-factly what Rome had done to his people, to his family. Marcus had listened in unflinching silence then too, and had held his gaze long after Esca’s lips had fallen silent, and his own eyes had sunk back to the tiny, dancing flames between them. Marcus had  _ listened  _ to him, and Esca remembered that now.

For a time they stood sentry over the spot, but eventually, Esca’s roiling emotions coalesced into a sharper kind of grief that cut deep into his soul, and he turned his face to Marcus’ chest and wept silently against his tunic. 

Marcus raised his free arm and held Esca close to the solid warmth of his chest, cradling the back of his head without speaking. There were no words for what had happened here — this horrific clash of cultures, both proud, both fierce, both unrelenting — but in that moment, invading Roman and native Briton stood together on the river bank and closed the gulf between them just a little more.

After stretch of long minutes, Esca stepped back and smeared his cuff across his face. “I should tell him of you,” he croaked, pale skin blotchy and eyes red from crying.

Marcus’ brows shot up. “You think your father would approve of me?”

Esca suddenly grinned with unexpected delight and amusement, and he smacked Marcus with the back of his hand in the centre of his solid chest. His knuckles came away damp from the tears that had soaked into the wool. “You say that like you’re some girl I’m introducing to my parents,” he scoffed.

Marcus laughed a little, blushed very prettily, and then stepped away. “I’ll leave you to speak with him. I’ll take the horses to the treeline. Join me when you’re done, but take your time.”

Esca nodded and watched him go. 

His gait was lumbering and he tripped on the ragged turf more times than Esca cared to count, but eventually he made it to the thicket on the edge of the silent, empty battleground, and stood with his back to Esca, offering him what privacy he could while he loosened the horses’ girth straps, talked to them and stroked their necks.

So Esca knelt alone and drew his father’s dagger from its place on his belt, and on impulse he bared it and laid it down in the icy water. It settled like just another stone onto the smooth pebbles of the riverbed and Esca watched as the clear, rippling water distorted the engravings on the hilt in much the same way that the memories of his childhood had been warped by time and trauma. Mesmerised by the sight of it, he told his father everything that had happened in the seven years of slavery since the battle, and then the year and a half he’d been with Marcus.

The weak warmth of the winter sun washed through him as he spoke, and he could almost imagine it was his mother’s hand on his shoulder, encouraging him on while his father sat stony-faced before him. And Esca talked and talked, holding nothing back.

By the time he’d spoken himself hoarse, the day had worn on into afternoon and great fluffy clouds had billowed to life in the blue sky above. His legs were numb from kneeling on the wet grass for so long.

Just as he finished a quiet prayer to his gods to watch over the souls of all the men and women of the Brigantes who had fought and died here, he heard a choked yell of surprise from behind him, and a shrieking whinny from one of the horses. 

In a flash, he lurched to his feet, twisting just in time to see Marcus be dragged by the throat back into the trees by two figures clad in earth-brown clothing.

Esca had never run so quickly in his life; not even when he’d left Marcus shivering in the river gorge to find Metullus. 

Shouting Marcus’ name, he ignored the spooked horses who had trotted snorting out into the open pasture, ears flicking and movements skittish. With his thighs and lungs burning from the sudden burst of speed after so long in his seated vigil, he crashed into the trees and halted, breathing hard and listening.

He didn’t have to look far.

There, down a short slope and standing in a great divot where a massive beech had toppled to leave its roots exposed like blackened, rotting fingers, he found two huge Britons, and Marcus standing at knife-point with his hands up. Between them, Marcus seemed almost slender in comparison.

Esca’s vision slipped sideways as the memory of Marcus on his knees, throat bared to the Seal Prince, flashed across his mind before he blinked it forcibly away. 

“Release him,” Esca snarled in his native language. He couldn't tear his eyes away from that blade at Marcus’ throat. He was not going to lose Marcus like this. Not now.

“He’s Roman,” sneered the blond, bearded figure on the left.

“He’s with me,” Esca fired back. “Release him.”

“Who do you think you are, ordering us around?” the second asked, twitching the blade at Marcus’ throat.

“I am Brigantes,” Esca said, raising his chin a little and meeting their gaze directly:  _ I am a chieftain’s son. I am Esca MacCunoval. _

At his words and tone of voice, the men’s bravado flickered. “There are no more Brigantes,” the big blond one said. “His kind wiped us all out.” And with that, he punched Marcus right in the gut.

Horrified that the blade would have sliced into Marcus’ throat, Esca jerked forwards, but the blade had been drawn back at the last moment, and Marcus just grunted, winded but otherwise unharmed. His soldier’s training had kicked in and he’d sensed it coming, tensing and exhaling in time to ward off the worst of it.

Livid, Esca ripped off his cloak and shoved the sleeve of his tunic up to reveal the royal pattern inked into his arm. “ _ I am Brigantes _ ,” he snarled again, spitting each word out like a fresh blow, as if his word really could still be law after all this time.

The knife dropped from the man’s suddenly limp fingers and he knelt as if hamstrung. The blond was not so quick to move. “Lord,” the kneeling man rasped. “Forgive me. We did not know you.”

Esca raised an eyebrow, ignoring the strange way his stomach had plummeted. ‘Lord’ was the title he should have borne now after his father and brother’s death, had his people survived. Had he not been dragged off the battlefield and slung into a slaver’s cage to be transported south for sale, he would have become Chieftain of all the Brigantes, lord of five hundred spears... Now he was simply this Roman’s freedman, but they didn’t need to know that.

Instead of dwelling on a dream that could never be, he spoke in quiet Latin to Marcus. “You alright?”

“Surprised,” he said carefully, still without moving even though there was no longer a knife to his neck. Eyeing the man on his right, he said, “Leg hurts like a bitch where they yanked me off my feet, but otherwise I’m unharmed.” He huffed a short laugh and added, “My pride is a little bruised, but it wouldn’t be the first time.”

Relieved, Esca smirked grimly.

“What’s going on?”

Esca looked at the two men. “They’re Brigantes,” he said. “And they don’t like you here.”

“I  _ did  _ tell you it wasn’t a good idea for me to come with you,” Marcus said dryly. “What happens now? Why is he kneeling?”

Esca turned to the blond and said in his own tongue, “I am Esca, son of Cunoval. And this Roman with me is my sworn brother —” that was technically a stretch of the truth, but it was true enough in his heart. “Touch him again, and I will kill you. I came here to pay my respects to the place where my people died —”

“— where his kind butchered them!” the blond roared, his temper flaring hot again like a snuffed taper in a strong draft.

“Calgacus!” the kneeling Briton snapped. “Mind your fucking mouth. I know those markings. It’s him. It’s Cunoval’s son.” He looked up and said, “I came with your mother’s people when she married your father.”

“I don’t remember you,” Esca said, wishing he could place the man. 

And then he suddenly wanted nothing more to do with this place. There, between the dense trees, he felt as though all the misery and pain of his people had festered like a foul miasma, choking the life out of him the longer he stood there, and he rasped, “Marcus. Let’s find the horses and go.”

“You sure?”

“Yes. We’re leaving.”

Marcus nodded and hobbled warily away from the men and the hollow in Esca’s wake.

Out in the grasses, Marcus whistled to Gallant, who trotted over alone, while Esca’s gelding had taken himself off to the furthest side of the meadow. 

When Esca, fuming, finally caught his own damned horse, he tightened the girth and vaulted up onto the sun-warmed saddle before urging him into a fast trot back to the road. Marcus was still walking up the hard-packed surface to join them, and he looked around sheepishly with Gallant’s reins in his hand as Esca passed them at a brisk jog.

A black cloud descended on Esca’s mind as he let the gelding stride out ahead, eager to put distance between them and that field of death, and it was a long few minutes before he realised he was alone.

Panic shot through him and he whipped around in the saddle, nearly falling out of it in relief when he saw Marcus — still walking — on the road behind him.

Then he noticed the sharply-rocking gait and the gritted jaw and the white knuckles on the reins in his hand, and he realised that Marcus  _ couldn’t  _ vault up unaided onto Gallant’s back the way Esca had done. His leg was too sore and too weak.

“Shit,” Esca hissed and doubled the gelding back. “Marcus, I’m sorry.”

“It’s fine,” he rumbled, halting as Esca reined up and slipped gracefully down beside him.

He stepped round to the mare’s side and knelt, lacing his fingers. “Here.”

Marcus’ eyes stayed sad as he smiled his thanks and let Esca propel him upwards by his good leg while he hauled on the saddle to help. He settled with a hissed inhale, but nodded curtly, and they set off again.

For a mile, neither of them spoke.

Finally, as they rounded a corner and a stunning view opened up below them, Esca said, “Thank you. I think… I think I needed that. I didn’t know I did, but… I feel… lighter now despite everything.”

“I’m glad,” Marcus said quietly.

“I’m sorry about those men…”

“I was an idiot again, and stopped paying attention,” Marcus said breezily, though it was clear his pride was still smarting. 

“Are you hurting much?”

“Enough that I’d welcome an earlier camp tonight,” he admitted. “But I will happily ride until you decide you’ve put enough distance between that place and wherever we rest.”

And Esca loved him fiercely for that. If he hadn’t loved him already, he would have loved him for that. Marcus would have ridden himself to death if Esca had asked it of him. 

He couldn’t find the words to express his gratitude, so he just bowed his head and nudged the gelding on with his eyes glassy and his heart oddly light given the events of the day.

It wasn’t until days later, when they were sitting down to dinner at an inn’s scrubbed table in Ratae, that he realised he’d left his father’s dagger lying in that stream. After the initial pang of loss, he realised there was no more fitting place for it to rest than where it had first come into Esca’s possession. 

Let it lie there for all time, buried eventually by the innumerable pebbles washed down from the hills that his ancestors had called home.

A cairn to his father’s memory.


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Marcus and Esca return to Calleva at last, and are confronted with the truth of their relationship to one another, both in the baths and in the darkness of the quiet night. 
> 
> There's also an _Oh. _in there too.__  
>  Yeah. One of those 'Oh.'s.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you so much for your lovely comments so far! And for those of you on Tumblr who've dropped by to say hello as well :). It's lovely to be welcomed into the fandom, even if I am a decade late :) (I did bring enough Starbucks for everyone though...)

By the time they trotted into Calleva, Esca’s wilful gelding was tracking up perfectly, and had the manners to rival any of the finest horses in the Roman empire…

...except for when he thought no one was paying attention. 

_ Then  _ he was still an absolute little shite with demonic pincer-teeth and a sly cow-kick that could knock an unsuspecting man flat on his back in the dirt. No wonder the stable master had sought to get rid of him. A horse like that would never behave in a cavalry line. 

Without the need for two horses any more, they decided to sell the gelding at a stables just outside Calleva. His pretty face and smooth paces earned them an equally pretty price, though Esca heard his new owner yowl and curse at the horse before they were even a hundred paces from the yard. Marcus used the money from the gelding’s sale to pay the garrison commander at Calleva back for the loan before he’d even reached his uncle’s house.

Marcus laughed softly as they walked Gallant on a long rein through the familiar town, and Esca sighed, resting his cheek unthinkingly on the filthy weave of the cloak stretched over Marcus’ broad back. It was oddly nice to be riding behind him again.

He felt, rather than heard, the rumble of Marcus’ sigh, and didn’t miss the way the man leaned back just a little into his embrace. Esca had to fight then not to tighten his hold on Marcus’ waist any further, and he swallowed, straightening once more and letting go of Marcus’ hips. When they’d left Calleva all those months ago, he’d been nothing more than Marcus’ scrappy little Briton slave, with a sour look on his face and hate in his eyes. It wouldn’t do for the triumphant Marcus Flavius Aquila to be seen with a creature like that plastered pathetically to his back.

Uncle Aquila’s formidable cook gave an ear-splitting shriek when she found the two of them entering through the back of the house, but to Esca’s surprise, Sassticca bustled up to them and embraced them both, propriety be damned. “Oh young master,” she laughed, fondly yanking Marcus down by his ear and kissing his forehead.

Smiling, Marcus allowed it.

“Oh, it’s so good to see you back. And you Esca,” she added, though she still seemed to regard him as though he were a barely-tame dog that might yet bite at any moment.

He offered her a small, tight-lipped smile and nodded. “Good to be back,” he said.

“Esca is my freedman now,” Marcus told her, and the woman’s eyebrows rose.

“Is he now,” she said. “Well, congratulations, Esca. Can’t say I didn’t see that coming either. I’ve said these many moons past that you two are like two halves of an almond. I’m glad of it for you.”

Again, Esca flushed and took half a step back, hands balled awkwardly at his sides.

She turned her sharp attention away from Esca and back to Marcus. “I suppose your return means there’ll be a dinner, as soon as I can scrape together enough food for it? You should have written to your uncle, Marcus. He’s been terribly worried. And if you  _ had  _ sent word of your arrival, I could have had that feast already prepared!”

“My apologies, Sassticca,” Marcus smiled. “It’s been quite the journey. Please, take your time with the feast though. There’s no need to begin celebrating before Esca and I have even had a chance to wash off the dirt from the road.”

“And you can put those clothes out for the rag collector,” she hissed, glowering in understandable revulsion at their festering cloaks and tunics.

Marcus nodded and headed into the main house, where in no time they found Stephanos and Aquila playing latrunculi in one of the cosy entertaining rooms.

“Marcus!” old Aquila cried, leaping from his seat like a sprightly young man and beaming at him. “Oh Marcus, you’re back! You’re alive!”

“I am,” he chuckled. “And Esca too. Esca is no longer a slave, uncle. He earned his freedom a thousand times over, though it still needs to be made legal before a magistrate. Perhaps you will oblige?”

“You’ll need another citizen as a witness, but of course. Kaeso next door will probably oblige,” Aquila said, looking Esca up and down. “Thank you,” he said, and the words rang deep.  _ You kept your word after all _ . “Now, tell me everything, Marcus. Were you successful?”

After a long, slow inhale, Marcus nodded. “We were. I left the Eagle with your friend Claudius, of the Sixth in Eboracum. He has promised to write to the senate in Rome, and will pass on anything to us here that may come back from them regarding our endeavours. But before I get too caught up in telling you all about it,” he added wryly, “If you don’t mind, I think I would very much like to go and bathe.”

“I think I would also like that very much,” Aquila smiled, eyes twinkling. “You smell like a pair of Tiber rats. You may tell me more over some supper, but I’m so glad to have you home again, Marcus.”

With a shy smile, Marcus bowed his head and left his uncle to his games, with Esca walking silently behind him since there was not quite enough space to walk two abreast in the corridor. 

They both automatically made their way through the house towards Marcus’ old room, but Marcus came to such an abrupt halt in the doorway that Esca rammed into his back and the impact sent him staggering backwards a pace.

“Marcus?” When he didn’t respond, Esca put his hand lightly on Marcus’ waist - really the only part of him that was properly within reach - and tried to peer past. “What’s wrong?”

“Nothing,” he said abruptly, stepping inside with a small shiver. “It’s just… Gods, I didn’t even  _ think  _ about where you’d be sleeping when we got back. I’m sorry, Esca. Of course, you must have one of the guest cubicula…”

A tiny smile etched itself onto Esca’s mouth. “I’d rather stay here, I think.”

Marcus whipped around and glared at him so forcefully it felt like a punch to the midsection. “Esca, you can’t sleep there. You’re not my slave.”

“No,” he said very carefully. “I’m your  _ friend _ . Can I not choose where I sleep?” he added with an arched eyebrow.

“I… Of course you can… but… there’s only your old pallet on the floor…”

“I’ve slept in much worse places these past few months,” he said wryly, “But if you’d rather I took a spare room, then I will.”

“I… I think I would,” Marcus said faintly.

With a deep inhale to quash the sting of his rising disappointment, Esca bowed his head and retreated, seeking out Stephanos to find suitable accommodation. “I’ll see you in the baths,” he said as he left.

By the time he’d settled in the smallest cubiculum — incidentally, the one right next to Marcus’ — he’d heard Marcus limp away down the corridor. His telltale dragging right foot gave him away, though Esca felt sure he’d know Marcus’ presence anywhere by now, and he set off to join him in the bath.

Marcus was just easing himself down into the large pool of the caldarium when Esca slipped inside, silent as a shadow. His eyes raked involuntarily down the bunching muscles of Marcus’ chest and arms before they disappeared below the waterline, and he bit his lip. Those gods-damned centurion’s shoulders… freckled too. Marcus still looked just as good as he had when they’d left for Calleva, if perhaps a little gaunt in places, and bearing a few new scars.

Turning away, Esca ditched his disgusting clothes in a pile beside Marcus’ and turned back to face the bath. Marcus had his eyes closed already, leaning back and luxuriating in the water like a muddy hog in the summer heat. He didn’t open his eyes as Esca joined him. 

It seemed strange to be in the water  _ with  _ him this time, instead of standing resolutely at the edge of the room and waiting for him to stop soaking and splashing about.  _ A definite improvement _ , he thought with a private smile as he dunked his head under the water and bobbed up again like an acorn.

“Ah… Esca…” Marcus groaned wistfully some time later, still looking a little pained despite the warmth of the water lapping around his chest. He was kneading his thigh beneath the water. “I wish you’d known me before.”

_ Before _ . Before the leg injury. But all Esca could think was that he would not have liked a Roman soldier  _ before _ , no matter the nature of the man beneath the helmet. Marcus was not the only one who had been made to see a new facet to strangers this past year or so.

“I don’t need to have known you before,” Esca said very quietly. “I know you  _ now _ , and I know that you’re a good man.”

Marcus’ smile struck him as deeply sad. “I suppose without the injury, I never would have met you, so I shouldn’t begrudge it too much…”

Esca wanted to smile at that, but he couldn’t. That injury had brought Marcus so much misery, so much pain and needless shame, that the company of a scrawny, sullen Briton couldn’t possibly outweigh all that.

When the water began to turn their fingers to raisins, Marcus heaved himself up out of the bath without going to the step. Esca had to look away as rivulets of water cascaded down the sharp planes of Marcus’ olive-skinned body and over the ridges and lines of muscle. There was something especially inviting about the jutting angles of his hips and lower torso, and it made him want to bite and suck bruises there until Marcus bucked and grunted beneath him. 

A moment later though he found himself saying, “Lie down on the bench.”

“What? Esca, no. You don’t —”

“—I know. I want to.” 

He looked up to find Marcus scowling down at him, with the towel held loosely in his hands just barely covering his modesty. 

“Trust me.”  _ You must know that I would not have mentioned it if I didn’t want to, surely? _

Marcus licked his lips and looked on the point of refusing. At that moment, however, Esca stood up abruptly from the water, and he didn’t miss the way Marcus’ gaze skittered involuntarily down his own body. Somehow, that must have been the first time Marcus had ever seen him without either his slave’s rough tunic or the thicker, British clothes from their journey.

“What?” he challenged, smiling. “Never seen a naked Briton before? We’re not all covered in scales or fur. Well, maybe the Coritani are, but the less said about them, the better.” That was a joke any Brigantes would have got, but it fell flat here in the steaming bathhouse with only a Roman for company.

“Your tattoos,” he said, unmoved. “I didn’t realise they went so far down...” In fact, they went all the way from shoulder to hip bone in a tumbling mass of spirals and intricate knots.

“Oh.”

“Do they… represent anything?”

“Yes,” Esca whispered before snagging a clean tunic from a bench to his left, still facing Marcus. It stuck unpleasantly on his wet skin as he tugged it on. Heedless of the physical discomfort, he crossed to fetch a pot of perfumed oil that sat on a shelf in an alcove on the wall. “Lie down, Marcus.”

And Marcus did.

In fact, to Esca’s mild surprise, he sank obediently down onto his stomach without argument and pillowed his cheek on his hands, elbows splayed, legs together.

At the first, languid drip of oil down the length of his spine, he groaned and bucked softly. Esca swallowed. He’d somehow forgotten, in the months since he’d last attended Marcus, that the man had the most adorable dimples at the base of his spine, just above his buttocks.

At the first dig of Esca’s fingers into the bunched and corded muscles of his shoulders and back, Marcus sucked in a short breath, and then... he groaned like he was having the best sex of his life. 

Esca nearly snorted at that, but it occurred to him shortly afterwards that Marcus had never boasted of any ‘conquests’ in the way his previous Roman masters had. Perhaps he actually had very little experience. That sounded more like him, Esca mused fondly as he worked his hands up and down Marcus’ back in silence. Too proud to pay for a whore, too honourable to fuck a slave.

When Esca’s steady hands reached Marcus’ hips and buttocks, he paused, and then decided to skirt around them, no matter how glorious his arse looked presented like that. Instead he moved on to the back of Marcus’ legs, working all the way down to his ankles. 

By the time he was done, Marcus was almost asleep, and pliant in a way Esca had rarely seen him, even when they’d done this before. Before, Esca would have said Marcus ‘endured’ the oil and strigil part of bathing.

Taking the strigil, Esca drew the blunt, bronze curve over Marcus’ muscles in the way he had come to learn Marcus liked, and sure enough, Marcus groaned at the fleeting pressure-pain, olive skin and muscle rippling under the delicious pressure of it.

And Esca  _ wanted _ .

In that moment, he wanted Marcus in a way he never had before. He wanted to slide his oil-slick hand over the curves of Marcus’ delicious arse and spread his legs wide, caressing him, and then slip a finger inside him, opening him up gradually, torturously — oh gods, he’d be so tight — hearing all the noises that would undoubtedly spill from Marcus’ lips once he realised just how incredible this could feel, if only he could let go of all that gods-damned Roman pride—

“Roll over,” Esca rasped, drawing back. “I’ll do your front.”

“It’s fine,” Marcus croaked, looking back over one shoulder. “I… You don’t need to do that.”

“I know I don’t. I thought we already went over that. I want to.”

“I know, but… uh… your -- the touch -- it’s… I mean, I’m…”

“Marcus, I’ve tended to your leg a thousand times. It’s not like it’s nothing I haven’t seen before.”

“Esca, that’s not…” he flushed and then buried his face back down in the crook of his elbow.

_ Oh _ .

Esca barked a bright, delighted laugh that reverberated around the room and made Marcus’ blush deepen, though all Esca could see of it was the dark red of his ears.

“Marcus, it happens. It’s fine.” It was happening under his own tunic too, though he was careful about how he stood in relation to the table so that Marcus wouldn't see it. When Marcus still squirmed visibly, he snorted and said, “I’ll put a cloth over your hips if you’re that worried about your modesty.”

“I… I’m sorry. It’s —”

“— Marcus,” he groused, still laughing. “It’s fine. Stop fussing and turn over.”

“Sorry,” he mumbled.

And with that, he rolled over slowly, and Esca quickly lay a cloth down over his flushed, straining cock. 

Esca would probably never forget that brief, beautiful sight of it as long as he lived. It could fuel his fantasies for months to come, and when he lay alone in his bed with his hands on himself, it would be that image alone which would push him over the ragged edge, he knew. Marcus’ cock was flushed dark and already leaking a little, bobbing against his lower abdomen, and he was indeed huge. How he’d managed not to rut into the bench beneath him, just for a little relief, was beyond Esca.

Marcus did not relax in this new position, no matter how much Esca worked the muscles of his legs. He was tense and clearly embarrassed, and — interestingly — his arousal did not go away. If anything, he got even harder the more embarrassed he got.

“Marcus, this is pointless if you don’t try and let go.”

“I’m sorry,” he said again, throwing his forearm over his eyes. “I can’t. I…”

Esca drew in a long, slow breath and then gave his thigh an affectionate final squeeze. “It’s fine. I understand.”

“Esca, I —”

“I know, Marcus. Drop it. At least I got your back done. I’ll… see you at dinner, alright?”

And with that, he turned and left, trusting that Marcus could make it back to his rooms under his own efforts this time. 

He and Marcus did not encounter each other again until they emerged for the dining room at Stephanos’ bidding later that night. 

Following the simple, flavoursome supper of boiled eggs, baked fish, rosemary bread, and some honey cakes that Sassticca had somehow found time to whip up while they were in the baths, Marcus leaned back in his chair and carefully but audibly cracked the tension from his neck.

They had told Uncle Aquila as much of their story as they had told to the legate, leaving out the parts that would always remain between just the two of them. Namely that consisted of the behaviour of the tribune in Eboracum and the events from the field of the slain Brigantes, though there were a plethora of other tiny details from their journey that went unspoken. 

In telling the part just before the skirmish in the river gorge, Marcus had clearly witnessed the grief in Esca’s eyes as he led up to the killing of the seal boy, Liathan’s own  _ son _ , but he didn’t flinch away from it. He honoured the child in telling of his bravery, both in facing his death and in giving them the head start that undoubtedly saved their lives. 

Esca still had the little carved fish that he’d given the boy. It had been clenched in his small hand when they’d moved him after the fighting had ended. 

Aquila’s face remained serious as Marcus spoke, and Esca felt a new respect for the old man when he turned to Esca and said, “I hope your gods will honour him as ours would. That was brave.” He paused and then said, “And the Selgovae? They cared for you afterwards, Marcus. That took great honour too.”

Marcus nodded. “They are good people. Will you write a history of the peoples of Britain once you’re finished with siege warfare, uncle?” he asked with a fond smile. 

Aquila looked to Esca and said, “I think, perhaps, I would not be the best person to write such a book.”

Unable to bear the intensity of Aquila’s gaze, Esca shrugged. “I can’t read or write,” he mumbled.

“That must be rectified,” Aquila frowned, taken aback at the revelation. Esca, after all, spoke fluent Latin, if with an accent. “Marcus, you can’t have your freedman illiterate.”

“I’ll have him however he wants to be,” Marcus snapped, and Esca flushed unexpectedly. “I’m sorry,” he sighed a moment later, running his thumbnail along the grain of the wooden tabletop. “It’s good to be able to rest finally,” he said to change the subject. He leaned his forearms against the table, shoulders slumping as exhaustion caught up with him all at once. 

The military armilla that had been deliberately left behind all those months ago was now back adorning his wrist, Esca had noted idly as it clacked against the wood and the gold flashed in the dancing light of the braziers. It suited him in the same way the golden neck torc had suited Esca’s older brother.

“Speaking of rest,” Uncle Aquila said with a shrewd light in his eyes, “I think we should all call it a night. Esca looks as if he’s about to plant his face down into his empty plate, and I certainly couldn’t carry you to your room, Marcus, if you were to pass out on me here.”

Not having realised he’d glazed over, Esca twitched awake again.

“Thank you,” Marcus said. “I think... I will retire.”

“Me too,” Esca added, rising carefully and noting the way Marcus gripped the table to lever himself upright. The bath and massage had eased the travel-soreness from his leg, but sitting down for so long and talking late into the night had largely undone Esca’s work.

For the first few paces as they left the dining room, Marcus’ limp was pronounced and sharp, as though he had broken glass lodged in the sole of his foot. Once the length of the corridor opened up before him, however, he exhaled shakily and found a steadier pace to stretch it out as he walked. 

At the curtain of Esca’s cubiculum, Marcus paused.

He swallowed thickly and then said, “’Night, Esca. And... thank you. For everything.”

It struck Esca as an odd thing to say, but he just smiled minutely, touching Marcus’ arm briefly, and then slipped inside his room. The curtain dropped silently back behind him like a veil between the worlds. 

An hour later, and despite his heavy exhaustion, sleep showed no signs of reaching for him to draw him down into her soft, dark arms. His mind raced, and all he could think about was how uncomfortable he was. Yet again, he rolled over and shuffled.

Something was missing. 

Despite having achieved everything they’d set out from Calleva to do, he felt empty. The lime-washed plaster walls seemed too cold, too blank, and the bed beneath him felt... wrong.  _ Empty _ .

_ Marcus _ . 

It was  _ Marcus  _ that was missing, he realised with an odd, lurching jolt. They’d spent so long in each other’s company that it felt jarring to be separated now, like he’d lost a limb and hadn’t regained his balance.

Rising reluctantly from the warmth of the blankets after only a few more minutes, he padded outside into the corridor, wearing nothing but a long, borrowed, undyed, baggy under-tunic which he suspected might have been Marcus’ at one point. 

A glimmer of light flickered beneath the hem of Marcus’ curtain and he paused. 

With a frown, he drew the heavy fabric carefully to one side and found, to his surprise, that Marcus hadn’t even attempted to get into bed at all.

“Can’t sleep either?” Marcus said without looking around. 

He was still fully dressed and stood with his hands braced on the corner table that sported his small altar to Mithras. His head was bowed as if still in prayer, and although the scent of incense still wafted gently through the room, the altar itself sat quiet and cold.

Esca said, “Should I go?”

At that, Marcus lifted his head to regard Esca. “No.” His deep voice was rough, perhaps from the lingering smoke, perhaps from something else.

Then Marcus flicked his gaze to the bed and raised an eyebrow in a silent question. In response, Esca smiled and shrugged. 

_ I don’t mind. It’s up to you. _

Closing their wordless conversation, Marcus smiled. 

It was a soft, shy, sweet smile that Esca had rarely seen on him, and this time it went all the way to his green-gold eyes, and brought out little dimples in his cheeks that made Esca’s heart flutter.

Marcus moved from his altar towards the bed, toes of his right foot dragging a soft whisper over the warm, tiled floor, and began to unbuckle his belt and pull off his tunic. While he did that, Esca removed his own and dropped it on the warm floor. If Aquila’s efficient hypocaust took enough of the chill off the air for  _ Marcus  _ to feel warm enough, then it would do for Esca too. 

If he secretly hoped that Marcus might press his chest against the bare skin of Esca’s back while they slept, well, he wasn’t about to admit that out loud. Not just yet.

As he bared his body save for his subligaculum, however, he heard Marcus take a sharp inhale, and, assuming his leg had betrayed him, Esca turned quickly to look at him. “What?” he asked when he found Marcus still upright but with his eyes wide.

“Your back...” he rasped.

For a moment, Esca frowned without understanding. Marcus had seen his tattoos earlier in the bath — why would they be a surprise now? And then his words filtered down through Esca’s mind. His back. Or, more significantly, the  _ scars  _ on his back. 

Esca bore the mark of every owner he’d had over seven years, in one way or another. By whip or cane, Esca had been beaten for his insubordinate behaviour by every single master, except for Marcus.

He shrugged. “I wasn’t a very good slave,” he said as he lifted back the sheets and heavy woollen blankets and slid into Marcus’ cold bed.

Silently, Marcus climbed in behind him and lay on his side, facing Esca’s bare back.

At the lightest brush of fingers against his skin, Esca twitched, and the contact retreated instantly.

“You can touch,” he whispered. An odd, fragile hope kindled in him. “It doesn’t bother me.”

“It bothers me,” Marcus hissed. “Esca, what was done to you was monstrous. And… I’m sorry to have been a part of it.”

“You weren’t,” he said quietly.

“I  _ owned  _ you,” Marcus sneered, as though the very thought of it made him sick now. “I...”

“You also set me free,” Esca countered.

“Too late,” Marcus said, and his fingertips traced the cross-hatched scars with a fearful reverence that made Esca shake. “I should have asked my  _ friend  _ to come north with me, not demanded it of a slave. That was also monstrous of me.”

“Ah, Marcus,” Esca almost laughed, fighting the urge to turn over and look him in the eye. “You truly have no idea what ‘monstrous’ is, if you think the things we’ve done as friends have been monstrous. When I was here as your slave, did you ever beat me?”

“No,” he murmured, still tracing the raised lines like he was lost in a labyrinth. Esca found he had to concentrate to keep his mind from tumbling down after him and getting lost too.

“And all those times I answered you back and challenged you openly, and looked you in the eye and refused to call you ‘ _ domine _ ’, what did you do?”

“ _ Nothing _ .” The word came out as little more than a harsh breath, and Esca felt it on the nape of his neck.

“Wrong. You  _ welcomed  _ it. You  _ wanted  _ me to challenge you.”

After a very long time, during which time the only sounds in the room were the soft rasp of Marcus’ heavy breaths and the light whisper of his continuously skating fingertips, Marcus spoke. “You said... You said back among the Selgovae that... That I gave you your life, Esca, but... after I was hurt, I’d stopped wanting to live.”

“I know,” he said very softly in the dark. “I saw it.”

“You saved me too.” Marcus sighed and his breath fanned out across Esca’s shoulders this time and made him shiver again. “Cold?”

“Mmm,” Esca hummed noncommittally, because it was easier than the truth.

A moment later and Marcus had pressed the whole length of his body against Esca’s, tucking his knees up behind Esca’s and pulling him flush to his chest. He left his arm trailing over Esca’s waist, and nuzzled softly against the back of Esca’s head.

“Alright?”

“Mmm,” he said again, because this time it was the truth, and he was half a heartbeat away from crying.

It was so indescribably good to be held, to be touched, to be cherished that he blanked out for a long time, unable to form thoughts through the sheer, glorious delight of that closeness. 

Lying there with Marcus in his bed in Calleva felt so different from all the times they’d huddled together in the wilderness, pressed close for practicality. There was no need for it now, and in fact it was a touch too warm. But without it, neither one would find a scrap of sleep, and they both knew it.

Only minutes later, Esca drifted off with Marcus’ steady warmth suffusing his whole being.

**Author's Note:**

> Keen for more? Let me know with a comment and a kudos, and I’ll post the next part soon. I've got a few more ideas for stories, so if you let me know that you enjoyed this one (or my other ones already up) then I'll try and get them post-worthy too!
> 
> Come find me at [coffeestainsandcashmere](https://coffeestainsandcashmere.tumblr.com) if you want to say hi and prove that the Eagle fandom is still alive and kicking somewhere in the world...


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